


Better the Devil

by adevyish



Category: Weiss Kreuz
Genre: Community: Weiss_kreuzmas, Gen, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-03
Updated: 2011-01-03
Packaged: 2017-10-15 11:37:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/160451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adevyish/pseuds/adevyish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even as a child, he knew when he wasn't wanted. Schuldig in the days before Rosenkreuz.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Better the Devil

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wispykitty](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=wispykitty).



> Everything I know about 1980s West Germany I learned from dflux and Wikipedia; apologies if I messed something up.

_Friederich_.

He hated that name, with the _ch_ at the end letting him know how displeased his mother was. At least his teachers called him _Mr. Schröder_ , like the respectable person he would grow up to be after he received his _Abitur_. However, he had messed up.

“You had the exact same answers as Ms. Aust. Could you explain how you were not cheating?”

 _Scheiß_ , his mathematics teacher had told the entire damned administration that he’d cheated. If Friederich had noticed earlier, he might have been able to wipe her mind, but even one mind would have given him a week’s migraine. It was only his first year of Gymnasium; if he was expelled now he’d end up in the worst Hauptschule in the city covered with bruises courtesy of dear mother. At least his mother wasn’t here.

“It’s math,” he replied as serious and shy as he could make himself. “I thought the correct answers were all same.” He looked up earnestly.

“You made mistakes on the exact same questions Ms. Aust did.”

That strategy didn’t work. All the teachers adored Anna Aust, though, Kusno in particular. She regarded Aust as her second coming.

“No one could hope to answer any question that Anna couldn’t!” he exclaimed with the right amount of admiration. “I’m surprised I managed to tie with Anna!” He had copied all of her answers.

“But—”

“Professor Kusno,” Demnitz, the school head, said placatingly, “you do not have proof, do you? Mr. Schröder is one of our most promising new students.”

“Fine. If you _ever_ cheat again—”

Friederich gave a quick nudge to Demnitz’s mind. “Now now, Professor,” Demnitz said, “he did not cheat.”

“If I ever suspect you of cheating again,” Kusno corrected, “you will not like the consequences.” She punctuated her statement with a glare.

“I understand, Professor Kusno,” Friederich said deferentially. “I hope I’ll show you that I’m a good student.” That was slightly too saccharine, but Demnitz believed it wholly. Friederich resisted the urge to laugh.

“I hope the next time I see you it will be to hand you an award,” Demnitz said as he escorted Friederich out of his office, and Friederich thanked him. He noticed there was tenth or eleventh grader daydreaming in the waiting room, but thought nothing of it. He wished he had.

 

The older boy approached him the next day. “Friederich Schröder, am I correct?” He had blue eyes, brown hair down to his shoulder, and an absolute certainty in Friederich’s answer.

“Yes,” Friederich replied neutrally. “Who are you?”

“Oh, I’m Peter Ehle. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of me.” Friederich was almost insulted; it was his _gift_ to know everything. The fifteen-year-old troublemaker was infamous for avoiding expulsion despite his outrageous behaviour and the strict rules of the Gymnasium. The teachers lived in fear of him and his family. “You managed to woo Demnitz in a month,” Ehle was saying. “I’m impressed.”

Friederich scrunched his face in faked confusion. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand?”

Ehle chuckled. “Don’t lie, I know your type right away! You’re the same type as me.”

That wasn’t possible. Friederich thought emphatically, _Can you hear me?_ He waited. There was no response, physical or mental.

“Your silence tells me everything,” Ehle said. _Verdammt_ , that was the second time in a week.

He muttered, “What do you want?”

“I have a spare ticket to Depeche Mode. Do you want to go?” It was too expensive for a prank, but Ehle was one of those people who needed no sense of expense. And Friederich could not say no.

“I don’t think my parent would approve of that.”

“It’ll be taken care of,” Ehle said.

 

Becoming sort-of friends with Peter Ehle, Friederich realized, was the worst thing he could have done for his social life. Friederich had no friends before, but now students wouldn’t speak to him unless absolutely necesary.

A few weeks after they’d first talked, Ehle arrived Friederich’s small apartment in the suburbs, looking like a proper student. Ehle flawlessly convinced Friederich’s mother of his tutoring credentials; Frederich gleaned from his mother’s mind that Ehle had, perturbingly, phoned ahead. Ehle informed her they were going to the Central Library for an “optimal” study environment.

It was a long tram ride to the arena. Friederich asked, “How did you find my address?” He actually wanted to ask how Ehle had found his phone number—Ehle was more and more difficult to read.

Ehle shook his finger. “Trade secret.” Friederich rolled his eyes and turned away. “Fine,” Ehle said, “I’ll tell you after the concert.”

“Your offer’s too good,” Friederich said, voice full of sarcasm. “I’d never want to study for my literature exam Tuesday.”

Ehle shook his head theatrically. “Look at you, becoming a mindless automaton for society.”

“I thought this wasn’t a tutoring session,” Friederich remarked.

“I’m not talking about anything as lowly as civil duty. I’m talking _philosophy_ , you know, the greats. You’d like Nietzsche.”

Friederich raised an eyebrow. “Because I like what you like?”

“Of course,” Ehle said dismissively. “I’ll give you the books.”

“Does money just fall out of the sky?”

“Of course.” Typical Ehle.

They talked all the way through both tram rides. Ehle never answered his question.

 

Ehle kept lending Friederich books and music, and taking him to events. Friederich had little time to study. The only reason Ehle, who did not have the _gift_ , was able to stay _had_ to be family donations to the Gymnasium. Despite his carefully maintained grades, most of his teachers thought of Friederich as a lost cause. One day Demnitz even called Friederich furtively into his office to warn him against Ehle.

“Budge over,” Ehle said, setting his tray down and taking the glass of juice from Friederich’s tray. “How was Sartre?”

“Goetz is a sacrificial idiot. Also, Kraftwerk? Seriously?”

Ehle shrugged. “It’s commentary.”

“It’s utter crap.”

Uncharacteristically, Ehle spent most of the meal quietly tearing at his beef. Ehle interrupted his butchery to ask, “Do you feel useless sometimes?”

“Lunch time, not nihilism time,” Friederich said. “Don’t make me regret talking to you.”

“You should; they all think I’ve taken away your innocence. They’ve never given a shit until now,” Ehle accused. “Look at what you’ve done to Demnitz!”

In the past few months, Friederich had completely forgotten—he could not read Ehle. He could not take Ehle for granted. “I’m _sorry_?”

“It’s over. I hope I’ll never see you again.” Infuriated, Friederich tried to force his way into Ehle’s mind, only to hear, in his own mind, _Don’t_.

 

He did not see Ehle again. After a while, students began talking to Friederich again, as if Ehle had never existed. Demnitz called Friederich to his office to encourage Friederich to begin considering his major. As Demnitz elaborated, Friederich forced his way into Demnitz’s mind. There, like a glass jar of memories, were Demnitz talking Ehle’s parents into transferring him to another school. A small wisp was attached to it, a thought of the pocket in Friederich’s schoolbag that he never used.

When Friederich left the office, he found a note in his bag, in Ehle’s elegant scrawl: _Learn to hide from me. I have been found guilty.—Goetz_


End file.
